Chapter 144: New rankings

‎”I surrender.” My clear voice rang out. Anastasia who was already poised to rush at me almost stumbled from sheer shock, before she hurriedly caught herself.

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‎She opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Instructor Lee beat her to it.

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‎”It’s over! The final match has now officially ended! The fallen prince, Damon Darkfell, has surrendered, and is unable to continue the duel! Anastasia Necron, the scarlet princess, has won!!!!!!”

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‎”Argh…” My legs buckled and my knees hit the ground with a low thud. Seven hells! My ribs hurt. It felt like most of my right side was broken and battered.

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‎I could physically feel the sharp splinters of my broken ribs piercing my lungs. Yes, it was excruciatingly painful. I tried to get up, struggling with all I had in me to rise to my feet. Yet, my body refused my command to move.

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‎In the end, I could only exhaustedly lay on my belly pressed against the cold, hard ground, breathing heavily as jolts of organ-rendering pain continued to course through my body.

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‎However, even through the jolts of pain, I had a satisfying smile on my face as I watched Anastasia’s face moved theough various expressions. From disbelief to frustration, and finally resignation.

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‎”Shameless bastard.” She shook her head with a resigned smile.

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‎Another groan escaped my lips as I tried to move a little and rolled over to my back, only for me to immediately pay the price as I got seized with a violent cough. I moved my hand to cover my mouth, only to feel something warm there.

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‎I removed my hand and looked at my palm only to see warm, crimson blood dripping down from it. Well, that’s to be expected since my lungs were literally punctured by my very own ribs.

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‎And what the hell were this people doing, not transporting me to the infirmary?

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‎I pushed through the pain and summoned a vial of healing potion from my spatial storage and chugged it down.

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‎After a few seconds, a cold sensation washed over my entire body and most of the pain-numbing and agonizing me lessened, so I sat back up and summoned two more vials of high-quality recovery potions, and greedily drank them all.

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‎I was frustrated by my loss. Somewhere deep inside my heart, I knew that I never stood a chance against Anastasia, after all she had wrecked golden boy up.

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‎However, after coming this close in our duel, and especially after freezing her and coming to think that I’d won, I thought maybe I could really defeat her. Even though I knew about her broken ability, I still foolishly thought that.

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‎Fuck how impossible it might be, but that girl definitely had an Omega ranked physique. I didn’t know how she attained it, or how if it was the physique she naturally awakened, but without doubt, she definitely had one.

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‎After concluding and making peace with my loss, satisfaction followed. Merely three months ago when I just arrived in this world, I was a mere kappa- ranked aetherial, but in such a short amount of time, I had been able to make it to the same level as the strongest individuals Nahaar had to show in my age group.

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‎Three months might have looked like a long time to go from kappa- to Eta+ rank, but in reality, it was quite absurd even with the fact that I went straight from the Kappa- rank to the Eta- rank at once.

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‎My eyes moved to Anastasia. When I had met her, I was only at the Eta- rank, while she was at the Eta+ rank. I was sure at I wouldn’t have even held a candle to her at that moment. But now I was able to fight her at an arguably even scale even though I ultimately lost.

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‎But hey, for what it’s worth, at least I didn’t lose to Rose. If her flames had devoured me, that would have been very hard to swallow. I might have even stopped believing in myself. Heh, like hell I would, the only thing that could make me stop believing in myself was if I wasn’t myself– if that made sense.

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‎While I still laid on the ground, the massive crystal above the stadium suddenly shone with resplendent light.

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‎”Everyone, it’s the new rankings, I repeat it’s the new rankings!!!” Instructor Lee had already started yelling even before the new rankings appeared.

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‎The new rankings would tally points from the written exams, the egg challenge phase, the maximum output phase, and most importantly, the tournament stage. While the tournament stage overrode them all, the other tests still helped precisely for other students who didn’t make it to the tournament stage, or for cases like the third place which would have to be between Alistair and Rose.

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‎Soon the light from the crystal cleared, revealing the new rankings. It goes as follows;

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‎————–

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‎#1. Anastasia Necron.

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‎–Written test: 378/400

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‎–Egg challenge phase: 5 Eggs

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‎–Maximum output: 321

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‎#2. Damon Darkfell.

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‎–Written test: 400/400

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‎–Egg challenge phase: 103 Eggs

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‎–Maximum output: 342

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‎#3. Rose Darkfell.

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‎–Written test: 376/400

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‎–Egg challenge phase: 68 Eggs

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‎–Maximum output: 425

‎#4. Alistair Von Drake.

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‎–Written test: 302/400

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‎–Egg challenge phase: 71 Eggs

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‎–Maximum output: 398

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‎#5. Fabian Ashton

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‎——————-

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‎The appearance of the new rankings sparked a chatter that grew noisier by the second. Even from down here, I could hear very well what most were chattering about. Some were debating if it was fair to put Rose and myself above Alistair since he was ’obviously’ stronger than we were. Obviously my ass.

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‎While I was certain Alistair would be at Rose, I was even more certain he wouldn’t be at me, after all, he was strong, but he was no Anastasia. His ability granted no hax, it only granted brute force.

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‎I quickly ran a simulation in my head, on how a fight my fight with Alistair would go if we had crossed each other, and after some time, I had come to a conclusion. ’I’d win.’ I inwardly declared with absolute confidence.

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‎Anyway, while some debated on the matter of the placing, some on the other hand, were more concerned with marvelling at the beauty of the red haired princess who just took first rank. ’Yeah yeah, we all know she’s beautiful.’ I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.

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‎It wasn’t like it was hidden. Anastasia mogged pretty much any female I’ve ever laid eyes on. If it wasn’t for her attitude and insufferable personality that I very well knew, I’m afraid I’d also be smitten like many others. Luckily for myself, I got to know about her insufferable personality beforehand, and was thus saved.

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‎Another thing that surprised me was the way the students who had been gasping at the cruelty she displayed earlier in her battle with Elsa suddenly forgot about that. Surely, this world was also like my last, one those with a facecard ruled. At least I was also at the top of the heirachy this time, rather than my average looks in my old world.

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‎One thing that didn’t surprised me however, was how Rose got ranked above Alistair. The reason it wasn’t surprising was that Rose kind of debunked Alistair pretty well in the written exams, and then in the maximum output test. So it was kind of obvious, at least to me who knew about it.

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‎Unfortunately for me, Rose wasn’t around, probably still stuck at the infirmary. That last backhand did hit her pretty well after all. If she was around, I’d have showed her the victory grin I had been practicing for the past week.

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‎Call me childish or a man child, but I was still doing it. Even though Rose had stopped giving me her victory laugh as we grew up over the years, I still had to repay the past ones.

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‎After a minute or so, my body finally healed up, just enough for me to get to my feet. Just like me Anastasia was still in the arena while instructor Lee continued to yell his usual commentaries.

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‎Anastasia walked towards me, and without exchanging a single word, we both started walking back to the stands.

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‎You couldn’t have just let me win?” I turned to her.

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‎”And why would I do that?” She twirled her red locks playfully.

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‎”Tsk, forget it.” I clicked my tongue. “I would have won if I was serious anyway.”

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‎”Yeah you would.” She nodded sarcastically.

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‎ We continued to banter as we walked back. However, just shy of the stairs, two figures suddenly appeared before us.

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‎One was my dear bastard of a brother, his sheer presence dwarfed the surroundings to our senses making it seem as if the world was centered around him. The other meanwhile was the silver haired beauty beside him. ’Silvie.’ I thought.

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‎Silvie was Emmett’s fiance, and his most loyal confidant. Even when she found out Emmett was behind most events and that he had a severe chest complex and that he views her also as a chess piece, she still stuck with him till the end.

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‎”What do you want?” Anastasia asked coldly.

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